All this news today, and the Dow Jones industrial average ended the day down only seven points. Perhaps investors were heartened by the detailed look the Wall Street Journal took Monday at the economic platform (such that there is) of John McCain. One lifeline thrown out by the Senator from Arizona to struggling Americans: He might have “a couple of fireside chats with the American people because of what we see in the [consumer] confidence barometers.”

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No, wait — there’s more. Congress and the White House may have rushed to pass an economic stimulus plan, and the Democratic candidates for president are pushing a variety of middle class tax cuts and foreclosure moratoriums and other quick fixes, but for McCain, reports the Journal, “the most potent economic stimulus would be to assure Americans that taxes won’t go up in the future.”

“In the shorter term,” said McCain, “if you somehow told American businesses and families, ‘Look, you’re not going to experience a tax increase in 2010,’ I think that’s a pretty good short-term measure.”

So making permanent tax cuts that McCain originally voted against because he thought, correctly, that they were an unconscionable, budget-busting giveaway to the richest Americans, will now provide a short-term stimulus to the poor and working class as the economy goes into the tank.

I guess that’s the kind of thinking on economic matters we should expect from someone whose chief economic adviser is Kevin Hassett, co-author of “Dow 36,000.”